Theater of War and Exile: Twelve Playwrights, Directors and Performers from Eastern Europe and Israel - Softcover

Radulescu, Domnica

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0786473126 ISBN 13: 9780786473120

Publisher: McFarland & Company, 2015

Synopsis

In what ways does political trauma influence the art arising from it? Is there an aesthetic of war and exile in theatrical works that emerge from such experiences? Are there cultural markers defining such works from areas like Eastern Europe and Israel? This book considers these questions in an examination of plays, performances and theater artists that speak from a place of political violence and displacement.

The author's critical inquiry covers a variety of theatrical experimentations, including Brechtian distancing, black humor, pastiche, surreal and hyper-real imagery, reversed chronologies and disrupted narratives. Drawing on postmodern theories and performance studies as well as interviews and personal statements from the artists discussed, this study explores the transformative power of the theater arts and their function as catalysts for social change, healing and remembrance.

About this title

About the Author

Domnica Radulescu is a distinguished professor of Romance languages at Washington and Lee University. She has authored, edited, or coedited nine scholarly books and collections of essays. Two of her plays have received recognition from the Jane Chambers Playwriting award and she is the author of two best-selling novels, with a third novel soon to be released. She is the founding director of the National Symposium of Theater in Academe.

Review

"Radulescu's examination of the theater of the Balkans, Romania, Israel, and other sites of violence and exile demonstrates the power of theater to enable the survivors of trauma to document and witness, to reclaim the real, to produce social change, and to promote the possibility of healing, both on the personal and national levels...a model for understanding how artists depict and resist unspeakable violence and living a national identity far from that nation...will surely be of interest to scholars from a wide variety of fields." --Kevin J. Wetmore, Department of Theatre Arts, Loyola Marymount University

"With an exile's insight and an advocate's clarity, with a scholar's thoroughness and an artist's passionate partiality, Radulescu assembles and frames an illuminating array of recent-and-contemporary theatrical manifestations that explore war-born, genocide-inscribed trauma." --Erik Ehn, Professor and Chair of Theater Arts and Performance Studies at Brown University

About this edition

• Publisher: McFarland & Company
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 0786473126
• ISBN 13: 9780786473120
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 264